After
John Silverter and Philippe
Nodet, Romain Bremont and
Demain Hall open Pakistan
North country by the airs!

You know
it's Blankonthemap is interresting
by paragliding or rather the
free flight performed by madmen
paragliders. Led by Philippe
Nodet and John Silverster,
the most exciting travel book
were told on this web site.
In an exciting meeting with
Philippe, we recognized the
same vision of romantic travel,
with a paraglider for him,
whith my feets for me. We
had flight projects in Tajikistan
duo, Philippe have gone too
soon ... This is not without
passion or emotion that pages
on the free flight are written
on this site and I know that
Philippe emulate passions
as Roman and Demain.

What Roman
and Demain have done in summer
2009 is definitely the work
of inpassionates adventureres
who risk their lives to more
than 6000 meters of altitude.
Paragliding in Northern Kashmir
is never trivial. Scrapping
heavens to rather see the
land of unparalleled beauty,
that's what they did with
a great authenticity.

[BOTM]
Could you introduce yourself?Romain Bremont is a paragliding
instructor, and Demian Hall
is a programmer. We both live
in Granada (Spain) and share
a passion for free flight
in the mountains and travel.
We dreamed of flying in the
high mountains of northern
Pakistan for many years and
finally decided to prepare
a 6 week trip flying in the
Himalaya, Karakorum and Hindu
Kush ranges.

[BOTM]
Why this dream ?

The mountains are some
of the biggest and most impressive
on the planet. The possibilities
for free-flight are incredible
and the locals are friendly.
It seemed like it had all
of the ingredients for a good
adventure.

[BOTM]
What was your way?

We started in Muzafarabad
(Kashmir) with the idea of
flying to the Karakorum via
the Kaghan valley and Babusar
pass. The weather, however,
had other plans and we were
forced to take a bus along
the KKH to Karimabad. We stayed
in Karimabad for 2 weeks waiting
for good conditions. When
they finally arrived, we flew
across to Buni. We spent some
time there and had some great
flights near Tirich Mir and
across to Chitral. From Buni
we flew to Phander (Ghizer
valley) and spent some time
exploring the ajoining Yaseen
and Ischkomen valleys in bivouac.
The conditions in the Ghizer
valley were excellent for
paragliding and we managed
plenty 100km+ flights.
To end the journey, we travelled
to Skardu and made an amazing
out and return bivouac trip
to Askole, flying above the
enormous Biafo glacier amongst
others.

[BOTM]
You've flown in many countries
around the world, could you
describe the peculiarities
of a flight in the Northern
Pakistan? The conditions in the high
mountains are fantastic. There
are few places in the world
where you can fly at nearly
7000m. Flying at these altitudes
can lead to hypoxia, but above
all it is the cold that you
have to battle. The huge variations
in altitude is something that
paraglider pilots don't usually
have to think about. It is
not uncommon to take-off at
3500m and climb to 6500m in
10 minutes. It is well worth
being acclimatised and phsically
prepared for the flights.
We chose to use oxygen, and
used it above about 5800m.
Overall the meteorogical conditions
are quite easy to understand.
There is often very little
meteo wind, and no valley
breeze. Generally the mountains
work just how you are taught
in school, with well organised
thermals puffing off the rocky
faces that are facing into
the sun. In Phander there
were already good conditions
on the SE faces at 9am!

For me, the Ghizer valley
provided us with the best
flying. It's situation between
the Karakorum, Hindu Kush
and Himalaya gives it enormous
potential for big flights.
In our experience, this was
also where there were the
most good flying days (at
the time of year we visited).
Nanga Parbat was almost always
over-developed, and Hunza
was too stable. There is not
much tourism in this area,
but the locals are very friendly.

[BOTM]
Did you have specific fears,
stories to tell us? Once I experienced hypoxia
when the batteries ran out
on the oxygen control unit!
You have to be careful of
cable near the villages -
I nearly landed in a canal
after avoiding an unseen cable
at the last moment. We were
often asked questions by confused
policemen at ckeckpoints;
it was quite hard for them
to grasp that we were coming
out of a closed valley without
having passed through the
checkpoint previously! We
had so many good experiences,
but one of the highlights
must surely be the night we
spent with the shepherds at
4000m.

[BOTM]
You say " A land to discover
people" : Why is it so
importante for you ?It would be a shame to
travel 8000 km without getting
to know some of the locals.
The paraglider is a great
mode of transport that allows
you to access remote and beautiful
areas. On top of this, you
often don't know exactly where
you are going to land. This
creates huge opportunies to
meet and interact with the
local people. They are almost
always extremely friendly
and helpful - which is lucky,
because you are really at
their mercy. I stayed in the
houses of many different people.
They always made me feel very
welcome. The shepherds in
the mountains prepared us
hot milk, butter and chapatis
- followed by a vegetarian
goat stew! - all of this in
their shack at 4000m with
direct views to the north
face of 7800m Rakapochi.

[BOTM]
what about hardware ?You must have warm clothes!
A good down jacket, down mitts,
thermal trousers, thermal
top, ski pants, gaiters and
a neoprene mask are all esential.
Oxygen increases your safety
and reduces anxiety about
hypoxia, which in turn allows
you to concentrate on flying.
The down side if the extra
weight - which is also an
important factor because walking
at 3000m with a 20 kg bag
is very tiring! For the bivouacs
we slept in our clothes. I
replaced the protection in
my harness with a thermarest
and we always flew with food,
water, first aid kit, ripstop
nylon sheets to make a shelter
and water purification tablets.

With a beautiful generosity, Romain
and Demain leave us their precious
references:

Northern Kashmir is an isolated and contrasted area, deserted
and arctic, largely admired and always jealoused on. This site
is an invitation through time and one of the most beautiful mountain
areas, to dream, one might want to dream of the last unknown soil
of the world. If this could be of use to you for any details or
future expeditions to Kashmir, it would be my greates award and
please feel free to contact me on this subject.